"Master, did you not sow good wheat in the field? Where did the weeds come from? He said to them: An enemy has done this."
-Matthew 13:27-28.
"Do not judge the gods, young man, they have painful secrets."
-Jean-Paul Sartre, The Flies (1943).
Sometimes I have had some difficulty in finding what I consider to be a suitable topic for an essay on here. And sometimes the topic presents itself.
I do not like to comment much on current events in the Church. There are plenty of people out there already doing that; and besides, I believe that good writing ought to have a timeless quality. The effect of the writing itself would not necessarily last very long if the topic of discussion has faded into a distant memory. But the events currently taking place in the Church are too big to ignore, and this is likely only the beginning. Obviously I am talking about the revelation that Cardinal McCarrick is a serial homosexual predator. For those who may have thought that the scandal of sexual abuse in the Church was slowly fading away, this is evidently not the case. The revelation in 2002 that there was a serious problem in the Church with homosexual abusers was terrible enough; but apparently the scope of what was and is taking place in the Church is far greater than what we had expected. We were told by many people that this was just a few bad apples, so to speak. Now it looks as if the problem is far more pervasive than we previously thought. We were told that the liberal media, ever an opponent of the Catholic Church, was distorting the stories to make it seem like things were worse than they are. Now it looks like, if anything, the media did not do justice to the moral and legal sexual crimes being perpetrated by Catholic clergy.
It is not my intention here to expatiate on the details of this affair; there are plenty of other people that are already doing that. For those who want to know more about the actual facts of what has taken place in this whole grim affair, there is no shortage of people willing to tell the stories, and even to do justice to the stories in the process. For my part, I intend to offer several observations that I have made about this scandal, which an ordinary critical mind might have thus far considered. There is surely much more than can be said about all of this than I intend to say; but so far these are the observations that I have made concerning the stories and the details coming forward.
First, this affair is, as I already said, far more pervasive than just a few bad apples. The Cardinal McCarrick story is one of the more horrendous so far, considering the former cardinal's high position in the Church. But the problem is incredibly widespread. The stories first broke in the Boston archdiocese in January 2002, as many will remember; but then it quickly spread throughout the United States and to other countries as well. Boston many have been the epicenter of the sexual abuse earthquake in the Church, but the shocks have been felt all over the world. From Boston to Honduras, from Pennsylvania to Chile, from New Jersey to the British Isles, there has been almost no place that has not been affected by this scandal. Even before the Cardinal McCarrick story broke in June, Pope Francis earlier this year was in the news for trying to appoint as a bishop in Chile a priest who was a close confidant and protégé of a homosexual abuser. The pope apparently knew what was going on, but dismissed the stories as rumors created by leftists and accused the victims coming forward of "calumny." Since the Cardinal McCarrick story broke, there has been another major story coming out of Honduras. The National Catholic Register here in the United States released a story about a letter from seminarians in Honduras complaining about the dominance of homosexuals in the major seminary there. These complaints and the report about them were dismissed as false by Cardinal Maradiaga, a close confidant of Pope Francis. And back here in the United States, we are waiting on the report coming forth in a month or so from the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, which apparently contains details of thousands of cases of sexual abuse by over three hundred priests in six of the eight dioceses of that state. If there are so many cases in only six dioceses of one U.S. state, you can be sure there are far more elsewhere across the country and around the world. So the story that this is just a series of isolated incidents is simply not true. This is a pervasive problem in the Church.
Second, almost as disappointing as the sexual abuse cases themselves is the almost total indifference of the Catholic bishops worldwide to try to rectify this problem. Coming to mind right now is Cardinal O'Malley's boiler plate bureaucratic legalese response to the Cardinal McCarrick story. There was not even any sense of compassion for the victims, any outrage about what took place, any anger towards McCarrick, any sense that he needs to suffer punishment for what he did, or that he ought to repent for having destroyed so many lives. But this is more than just inaction on the part of the bishops. As Rod Dreher and others pointed out in the Cardinal McCarrick story, basically everybody knew what Cardinal McCarrick was doing, yet no one bothered to stop him or to speak up about it. Some of them, no doubt, kept quiet because they have their own sexual secrets that they do not want to come to light. Others were intimidated by those in league with Cardinal McCarrick should they dare to speak out against such a prominent person in the Church. While we might be able to have some sympathy for those who were intimidated, not speaking up against such crimes is nevertheless a clear dereliction of moral duty. And no sympathy at all can or ought be given to those who simply do not want to be outed themselves for their own sexual behavior.
Third, what really inflames the anger is the indomitable arrogance of the clergy in the handling (or avoiding the handling) of this whole scandal. The clergy, especially the bishops, have a sense that they are above criticism or reproach because of their order in the Church. Since the clergy in general and the bishops in particular run the Church, they are answerable to no one else in the Church. This is natural enough in any society or institution; there is always some authority beyond whom it is not possible to appeal. It's the old problem of "who watches the watchers." This is not evidence of a constitutional problem in the Church, since all institutions have such issues. If you litigate a case in American federal courts, and the case comes before the U.S. Supreme Court, but the U.S. Supreme Court gets it wrong, you cannot appeal to anyone else. That is the end of the road. They are accountable to no one else. Such situations, for whatever it is worth, are unavoidable. But these unavoidable situations can be easily exploited by evil people for their own personal gain. This is exactly what the bishops and other clergy in the Church have done. They know that the laity cannot do anything against them, so they do not bother to clean up their act or try to rectify the problems in the Church. And they have been taught, as part of their clerical culture, to cover for each other. So if someone was to come forward to complain about sexual abuse or any other bad behavior from clergy, the other clergy would stick up for him. Back in 2002, when this scandal first broke, the U.S. bishops appointed Governor Frank Keating of Oklahoma, a practicing Catholic in good standing in the Church, to head a commission to investigate the sexual crimes that had taken place up until then. Governor Frank Keating resigned about a year later, saying he could not solve the problem, because in his view, the bishops were behaving like La Cosa Nostra. The bishops asked him to retract his remark, but to his credit, he stood his ground. There truly is a homosexual mafia currently running the Church.
Fourth, do not for a moment expect Pope Francis to clean up the situation. If the story about the scandal in Chile is any indication, he is as bad as the rest of them. When the victims there came forward to speak about the abuse they had suffered at the hands of Father Karadima, the pope accused them of "calumny" for saying what they did. Then the word came out that the pope actually knew about what was going on, even though he claimed he did not. The victims had presented a letter personally to Cardinal O'Malley about Father Karadima, and Cardinal O'Malley claimed that he gave the letter directly to the pope. Either the pope lied about not getting the letter, or Cardinal O'Malley lied about giving it to the pope. Regardless of whoever lied outright about the Father Karadima letter, it is noteworthy of how quickly Pope Francis went to defend Father Karadima and Bishop Barros against attacks that turned out to be completely true. Even Cardinal O'Malley was surprised about the abrupt response from the pope to the Chilean sexual abuse victims. Yet despite the shock at what the pope had said, and the likelihood that he was publicly caught in a lie about this matter, the pope made no apology for what happened. Many people in the Church like to think that because Pope Francis has a reputation of being "the people's pope," that he will be more likely to clean up the mess. Don't bet on it. He's in league with the rest of them. They are in control of the Church, and will do nothing to change the way things are operating. As Talleyrand said of the French Bourbons: "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing."
Fifth, one of the major problems in the entire Church that perpetuates this whole crisis is the clericalism. Not only do the clergy of the Church behave with an indomitable arrogance, as I mentioned, but the laity often feed them in their delusions. The attitude that "you can't criticize Father" or "you can't speak badly about the bishops" or "you're being uncharitable towards the pope" all allow for the clergy to continue to get away with what they are doing. Just because they hold high office does not mean that you cannot or should not criticize them when they do wrong. Yet there are plenty of people out there among the laity of the Church that believe that is exactly how this is supposed to work. And they do not just shut down any potential criticism as "uncharitable," they also have endless excuses for what takes place. This goes well beyond simply the sexual abuse, although that is the most egregious example of this phenomenon. Some people in the Church cannot even bear to acknowledge the existence of any bad behavior, sexual or otherwise, as coming from clergy. It's absurd, dangerous, and indefensible behavior. If you do not have even the will to see what they are doing wrong, or if you minimize it with excuses, then you are part of the problem. You are just another corrupt soul in the Church helping the clergy to bring about her ruination.
Sixth, a related phenomenon that does the Church no favors these days is triumphalism; the attitude that the Church can survive anything because she is the Church and she is guided by the Holy Spirit. Both of those things are true, but people use them all too eagerly to overlook the terrible problems gripping the Church. Christ obviously spoke the truth when He said that His words would not pass away, but part of the reason that what He said is true is because of decent faithful living in the world who refuse to tolerate the corruption in the Church. Too many people these days are willing to sit back and let everything fall to pieces because of their overconfidence that the Church will be able to weather this storm. That she may do, but she does need the help of individuals in the Church. And as I said, do not look to the clergy to clean up the mess. They are a huge part of the problem. As Fulton Sheen once said, it will be up to the laity to save the Church, not the clergy. And the Church will not be saved by making excuses, turning a blind eye to crises, or sycophantic treatment of the clergy. The laity need to speak up. They need to pray, they need to act, and they need to stop sitting on the sidelines allowing the rape of Holy Mother Church to take place.
Seventh, that the clergy of the Church over the last fifty years have shown themselves to be utterly untrustworthy in these matters of sexual abuse calls into doubt other things they have said and done. Nowhere is this more apparent than their constant reliance and insistence upon the Second Vatican Council. If so many of the bishops that defended the council over the last five decades claiming that it was the best thing ever are also the ones implicated somehow in the sexual abuse scandal, why should we believe anything they have to say? If they can get the issue of sexual abuse so hideously wrong, then there's no reason to believe all of their pompous and verbose nonsense about the wonders of the Second Vatican Council. Now I am not saying here that the council or subsequent popes were and are illegitimate; far from it. I have no patience for conspiracy theories. But evidently what the council did, however legitimate the council itself, was not to the benefit of the Church. That is largely a separate issue, but the same bishops that glorify in the council are the ones that have consistently either engaged in sexual abuse or worked to cover it up somehow. And as far as trust is concerned, the bishops have made some weak statements about working to regain the trust of the laity, but they have done nothing of the sort. If they ever decide they want to try to regain the trust of the laity, by the time they do, all of us currently living on earth will be long dead. Trust is easily lost, and almost never restored once it is gone. It will be up to future generations in the Church, those yet to be born, to learn to trust the clergy of the Church again.
This is about all that I can say on this matter at the moment, and it surely is a lot. As I said, the Cardinal McCarrick story is likely only the beginning of the storm. Other people, such as Steve Skojec, have said this already; and I am inclined to agree. I might have more to say in the future once more details emerge, particularly after the report from Pennsylvania is released. If I can offer some advice to the long-suffering and despondent laity of the Church, it would be this: do not give up hope. The picture now is as dark as its ever been, but now is not the time to abandon the Church. Truly there is never a good time to abandon the Church. But right now especially, she needs all of the help that she can get. I do not know how or under what circumstances control of the Church will be wrested away from the homosexual mafia, but the time will come. The guilty will be punished in this life or the next. God will not be mocked. Until that time comes, we need to hope, pray, and work to try to sort out this mess to restore the Church that we love.
